Qatar Airways will start direct flights from the Middle East to Adelaide in May next year.
The airline will fly its A350-900 Airbus services from Doha to Adelaide with links to other destinations including Europe, India and the US east coast.
Tourism Minister Leon Bignell says the move will provide a $41 million boost to the state economy and create about 220 jobs.
“We estimate it’ll bring $41 million [and] an extra 228 jobs to South Australia at a time when our economy is diversifying,” he said, per the ABC.
Bignell added that the flights will also benefit South Australians, who will now have another way of travelling easier to the Middle East, Europe and America.
“It reaches 140 destinations around the world, so what it’ll do is it’ll allow passengers to come from Adelaide from the Middle East from the east coast of the US and from destinations right across Europe and, importantly, we’ll also be able to fill the cargo of these planes with our premium food produce from here,” Bignell said.
According to the ABC, Bignell also said the State Government had not directly paid Qatar Airways to bring the flights to Adelaide, but would not discuss details of the deal.
“That’s commercial in confidence because we are up against other states, but we do deals with all sorts of airlines and just as we have a deal with Qatar,” he said.
“We also have long standing deals with Singapore Airlines, Cathay Pacific, Malaysia Airlines so we don’t go around telling people the deals that we’ve done with their competitors.”
